Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill

Thank you, Mr Speaker. The ACT Party supports any improvement in the regulatory system of Government. That’s why we support the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill, because it will make it easier for the Government agency—the Environmental Protection Agency—to assess chemicals, to assess products that are used on-farm, on roads, in factories, to assess them for safety, and to confirm that they are suitable for use in New Zealand. But the ACT Party must draw attention to the fact that this piece of legislation, which was crafted in the early 2000s in response to the dire threat of genetically modified organisms taking over and merging with other organisms and taking over the food production and maybe even taking over human beings—who knew?—is well out of date and long overdue for an upgrade.

But, of course, the reason it was so top-heavy and so complex to start with was because so many of the issues that concerned people about the environment and human health were not well understood by the activists and those who shouted the loudest at the time. In fact, there were a number of books written about the GE corn that was going to infect all the other corn and cause all kinds of problems with crops. That never happened. The other problem that this legislation was intended to address, of course, was the legacy of toxic chemicals produced in those decades after World War II, which included DDT, pentachlorophenol, 2,4,5-Trichlorophenoxyacetic Acid, Lindane, and Chlordane. They might have been used to treat timber or even to treat food, and, of course, what we know is that they were toxic to humans, toxic to future generations, as well as to plants and animals. Now, all of those chemicals have been banned and removed from use as far as practical, and, of course, there are much better controls now on how they’re used.

So what we’re left with, actually, is a piece of legislation that looked back to the problems of the 1980s and 1990s, when those highly toxic chemicals were still in use, and attempted to regulate them out of existence so they didn’t pose a threat to human health. But, by the time this legislation was passed in the early 2000s, new generations of much safer products for use in food production and agriculture and animal welfare, around the factory, and even on the roads to control weeds and other noxious materials where people drive and walk—that generation of chemicals that have been produced in the past 20-odd years is far less harmful, yet the legislation still looks backwards 20, 30, 40 years. So it’s good it’s being reformed, and it’ll be a much simpler pathway to get these hazardous substances classified so that we have a much better understanding of their risk and whether they are in fact hazardous or whether they’re safe to use with adequate precautions.

Now, I’ve had the great pleasure of spending weeks and months wearing full chemical and biological protective equipment including masks and respirators, and I didn’t do that for fun, maybe like some other members of this House; I did it for work. And what I want to tell the members of this House and people who might be watching is that actually, even though these substances may be harmful if used incorrectly, New Zealand is fortunate in that we have a good health and safety culture, we understand risks, and we get on with the job. The problem for people like the onion growers of New Zealand is in fact that they have applied for much safer chemicals that they want to use in food production than are currently allowed in New Zealand. They told us on the Environment Committee that in fact, some of the chemicals that they’re allowed to use in New Zealand are banned in other jurisdictions, like the European Union. They’ve had applications with the Environmental Protection Agency for reassessment for years and years and years without them being reviewed and without getting a decision. That’s putting their access to markets at risk, it’s also putting the health of people who consume products at risk, and it makes it much more difficult for the onion growers, for example, to deliver a product that they can be confident in to consumers.

So it’s good there’ll be an easier pathway. One of the reasons there’ll be easier pathway is because it provides a much more limited opportunity for people who are environmental activists or have a bee in their bonnet about something to oppose the use of particular substances on essentially an ideological basis. There are some people who say, “We can kill all the pests and weeds simply with steam or with a bit of lemon juice, or there must be some natural remedy we can use.” Well, the problem is that in an environment like New Zealand, there are a whole lot of pest and weed species introduced, actually, for which there is no natural remedy. Those weed species are out of place in New Zealand and can only be controlled with chemical control.

But one of the things the committee heard, which is of great concern, is not only are substances that might be used in the factory or on the farm or on the roads to kill weeds excessively regulated and hard to get permission to use but there’s a whole other class of things that this bill deals with that were, actually, not up for reform and discussion, and that is what this bill calls “new organisms”. Now, at the time the bill was passed, genetic modification and genetic engineering were seen as an enormous bogeyman. There were books written about it, there were documentaries done about it, and people thought that a genetically engineered sweetcorn was going to start marching from the fields into town and do all kinds of damage. Of course it never happened; it was a load of nonsense.

What we do know is that the use of gene-editing technology has the potential to deliver medical treatments that are currently unavailable in New Zealand. We heard from the Malaghan Institute, who told us that some of the gene-edited treatments for aggressive cancers that are available as of right in Australia and that save hundreds of lives every year are not available in New Zealand because of the regressive, backward-looking laws that mean we can’t use a genetic technology outside of the laboratory in New Zealand. And this law, the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act, is the main reason why we can’t do it.

So what submitters told the committee is, “Actually, it’s good you’re reforming this bit about on-farm chemicals and the sprays we use to kill weeds along the State highway, but actually, New Zealand needs you to focus on the really tough subject of reforming the laws around genetic modification and gene editing so we can have access to better medical treatments.”, and then, if we extrapolate from that, so we can have access to pest-control technology that currently is limited to dumping bucket loads of sodium monofluoroacetate, or 1080 as some people might recognise it, on to forests, on to farmland all over New Zealand—a poison that’s used in that way nowhere else in the world but which our Government, our Department of Conservation, and other agencies claim is the be-all and end-all and the only thing saving our forests from possums, and yet it’s quite clear that there are technologies available right now in terms of gene editing that should be up for discussion and that should be available in New Zealand.

And, then, we think about on-farm methane emissions. Well, I visited the Livestock Improvement Corporation (LIC) last year, and what they told us was that they found the gene to reduce methane emissions from cattle. So as I mentioned before in the House, actually solving climate emissions is quite easy. It doesn’t need 300 recommendations and strategies. The technology is available right now, but because of this legislation, which is unfortunately not up for debate today, it’s not available in New Zealand. What the LIC told us was, “If you had to take the gene for low methane, tasty meat, woolly sheep, animals that were resistant to pests, and, actually, animals that would have a better lifetime welfare, you would need access to gene-editing technology.”

So ACT will support this bill, and we will also be asking this Government: when are they going to bring legislation to the House to actually reform the thing that New Zealand farmers and families and businesses need most and people who need medical treatment?

Kia ora e te Mana Whakawā. Always an honour and a privilege to make a contribution in the House—yes, very briefly today on the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill. I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Minister, the Hon David Parker. We always appreciate it when he visits the select committee—the way he conducts himself and he allows us to have our opinions raised. So I want to acknowledge the Minister on his leadership.

As the Minister has said, this bill improves the way chemicals are assessed or reassessed by the Environmental Protection Authority. I would like to acknowledge also the chairwomanship of the chair, Eugenie Sage. She always does a really great job and involves us all making great inputs. As we’ve heard from members, about the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act (HASNO Act) 1996, can I remind the House that the purpose of HASNO Act 1996 is to protect the environment and the health and safety of people and communities by preventing or managing the adverse effects of hazardous substances and new organisms.

I want to acknowledge the 28 interested groups and individuals who made submissions but I acknowledge the submission made by the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment. He did make seven key points in his submission, but I’d like to conclude by acknowledging that he did make key points on new provisions to be published. What the bill does is it will provide efficiency and speed of assessments and reassessments of hazardous substances. The bill will also improve transparency, in particular, by requiring the Environmental Protection Authority to publish a work plan for assessments. I commend this bill to the House. Mālō.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I’m very pleased to rise and speak in support of the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms (Hazardous Substances Assessments) Amendment Bill. This bill, of course, has been to the Environment Committee and they have come back with a number of very sensible amendments to it. The purpose of the bill is a very worthwhile objective: to improve the assessment and reassessment of hazardous substances by the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA). The EPA, of course, is the regulator of some 150,000 hazardous substances, so it’s not an insignificant role by any means that the EPA undertakes.

National supports this bill because it’s a very sensible bill. It’s looking for efficiency. It’s looking to save time. It’s looking to save money. It’s looking to reduce duplication, and to produce better outcomes. Those listening could be forgiven for thinking the Labour Government has turned over a new leaf, because being sensible, looking for efficiencies, saving time and money, and looking for better outcomes has not been a feature of this Labour Government. But before we get overly excited about this turning over of a leaf, I should mention that it actually was the EPA that initiated these changes and initiated this bill. The EPA understood that it’s in everyone’s best interests that our hazard classifications are accurate and up to date. The EPA realised that to simplify the process to update the hazard classification of substances and the corresponding controls based on information from international regulators was a good thing to do. The EPA realised that they should try and gain greater efficiency to our assessment and reassessment processes for hazardous substances.

National understands entirely the rationale that it does seem to be a practical solution, a practical proposal, in this legislation to do all those things. We know that in other jurisdictions where information has been gathered, where money and resources have been spent and where we align with and recognise their scientific credibility, it makes absolute sense not to duplicate the work that has already been done but, rather, to contextualise it and to cut out some of the duplicated process here in New Zealand. This bill has somewhat unkindly been dubbed dull but worthy, and so with that I commend this bill to the House.

This bill is all about efficiency and, as other speakers have said, is about improving the chemical assessment processes by the Environmental Protection Authority. The hazardous substances are classified in that way, looking at their properties but also looking at the level of hazard that they entail. I’m told there are 3,500 individual approvals currently before the authority.

What this legislation is really doing is saying that there is good data out there, and where that data can be verified, and where there are good international comparatives, let’s efficiently use that information to make some quick assessments so that resources can be put appropriately into investigating the areas that might require more examination—where perhaps there is less data available, where there are conflicting stories around that data, or perhaps where there is different scientific analysis of the data.

So it’s a bill that’s about efficiency; it’s also one that enables us to move as the science moves. It enables the authority to take into account latest scientific data. So it’s a good piece of legislation. It’s a good way of getting the best out of taxpayer money, and it’s also going to contribute to the wellbeing of New Zealanders, because obviously we don’t want New Zealanders exposed unnecessarily to hazard from hazardous substances. So I commend it to the House.

“Dull but boring” is what the MP for Coromandel said about this bill, and there is an element of truth about it. But the Environmental Protection Authority did bring it before the committee, they did talk to us about how there are lengthy and very costly processes involved in the assessment and reassessment of chemicals. This amendment is about making sure that we’re not having to reinvent the wheel every single time, that we can actually rely on those international regulators, that obviously they’ve got similar systems to us that we can compare, but also that they have information that we can readily access. And “we” being the EPA—the Environmental Protection Authority. They do a great job. We hope that passing this bill, and the support that it’s getting around this House, is going to enable them to be able to get on with the job of assessing and reassessing those substances. And we heard at the committee that in some of those instances, some of the chemicals that they’re reassessing are actually better, safer chemicals than the ones that we’ve got at the moment. So we need to streamline that process. They talked to us about the lengthy delays; hopefully, this is going to do away that. I commend it to the House.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a great delight to be standing up here speaking on this bill.

💬 Hon Scott Simpson: An unexpected delight.

An unexpected delight, and I’m sure David Bennett will be listening intensely.

Look, I’m only going to speak for a few minutes. Clearly, this has a lot of support around the House. The Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) has a critical role again, ensuring that science is applied to challenging hazardous organisms and that it is done in a way that gives the community confidence but also allows appropriate chemicals to be used. If there are—as there are—global regulators with significant repute who have gone through a process of assessment in a way that the EPA feels comfortable with, then we should be able to use that data in a more efficient way to reach, one would assume, pretty similar outcomes. So the efficiency that is embedded in this is positive from the National Party perspective.

It has taken, of course, far too long for this to be prioritised up, frankly, a pretty thin Order Paper and for it to meander its way through select committee, and now, of course, we have to endure Government speeches all speaking in earnest support of it. But, frankly, this is the sort of thing that a Government could put a shoulder to the wheel and get progressed far quicker than has been the case. Not this Government, of course; that Government takes over in October next year.

But we do support it, and, I guess, a parting comment is that one does hope that as the EPA brings these new, efficient processes to its deliberations, it remains focused on ensuring that science and the truth that is inherent in science and data informs its decisions and that it doesn’t get captured by the democratisation of science that appears on most Facebook feeds that come across my path—or they certainly did when I was the climate change spokesperson—that seem to suggest that we’re all experts in our own lunchtime when it comes to interpreting science. The EPA have a critical role in ensuring that chemicals and other hazardous substances are effectively monitored but can be used in certain circumstances, and science and data must sit at the core of their deliberations. This bill will, one would hope, make those deliberations just that much more efficient. I commend the bill to the House.

I rise in the House, and thank you for the time to make a contribution to speak to the bill. I want to thank Minister Parker for his summary last week and chair the Hon Eugene Sage for the Environment Committee. I do want to thank the staff involved in drafting and putting together the amendments, and my appreciation to the members of the committee and all the submitters that took the time to put forward their thoughts, raising concerns through submissions to be considered on elements of the bill.

As I have just joined the Environment Committee recently, I’ve been reading quickly to understand the purpose of the bill and why it is important to have a much clearer position on the proposed legislation to help clarify and empower those involved in the work.

The bill makes improvements to the Act in the three main categories: (1) enabling the Environmental Protection Authority, otherwise known as the EPA, to make better use of information from international regulators; (2) making other improvements to the reassessment process; and (3) to make technical amendments.

The amendments proposed are needed in this bill to enable and allow these changes. The Environmental Protection Authority, otherwise known as the EPA, is the regulator responsible for making decisions on whether to approve new hazardous controls and new organisms, and to manage the risks and safeguard our people in the environment from approved hazardous substances. This transition allows the Government a fair and equitable process, as we must think forward in the future of our people and prioritise this bill. The current system is time-consuming and resource intensive and not fit for purpose. The amendments will improve a simplified process.

To conclude, the bill will improve the efficiency and speed up the measures of assessment and reassessment of hazardous substances, and, in particular, the EPA will be able to publish a work plan for reassessments to increase transparency and improve the wellbeing of New Zealanders. I commend this bill to the House.

The question is that the motion be agreed to.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a second time.